It’s time to rethink teacher training

Author

Lecturer in Science Education, Sussex School of Education and Social Work, University of Sussex

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James Williams does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

And the list of what teachers “should” or “could” be trained in is now very long. But while each call for training has a justified and reasonable argument behind it, we cannot escape the fact that initial teacher training cannot deliver fully trained, for every eventuality, teachers.

The general postgraduate route into teaching in the UK is 36 weeks long. Of those weeks, 24 are spent “on the job” in school – which leaves 12 weeks for all the rest. This isn’t a great deal of time when you consider those 12 weeks are when students will largely learn the skills required to actually be a teacher. This includes classroom management and lesson planning, along with how to deliver practical demonstrations and organise activities for pupils as well as subject knowledge for teaching.

Of course, there are also the fast track teacher training programmes like Teach First. Under these types of training programmes, high-flying graduates are placed in difficult schools with minimal initial training and ongoing support.

But the danger is that such an approach promotes a view that subject knowledge combined with altruism and social justice is all that is needed. And it is probably with this in mind, that Teach First has recently extended its training to a two-year postgraduate diploma model. Previously, their model included a one year Post Graduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) followed by a year studying educational leadership.

The 21st century teacher

The length of initial teacher training varies from country to country. In Finland and Portugal, for example, it is a master’s level programme taking about five years in total. While in Japan, teaching qualifications are graded, with the highest grades needed to teach in higher secondary schools – this also takes around five year’s of training.

Time for a rethink?

So although many of the above calls and demands may have good reason to be implemented, exactly how and when they are introduced needs a lot of further thought – because trying to cram it all into 36 weeks just won’t work.

Perhaps in the UK, then, it is time we looked again at the demands of teacher training, and rethink how long it should take, along with what exactly initial training should cover. Because things can’t carry on as they are.

And by working out how we want future training to look, we can decide what “core initial teacher training” must involve – and at the same time work to ensure there is an entitlement for, and ongoing provision of, training for all qualified teachers.